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CIjs Siurifio Consunuir, 



LIFE 



O F 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER, 



A SOLDIER IN THE ARMY OF THE POTOMAC. 



JEREMIAH TAYLOR, D. D. 

il 



Honor is the reward of action. 



\ 

BOSTON 






B 

HEISTRY HOYT, 

No. 9 Corn hill. 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1863, by 

HENRY HOYT, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



GEO. C. BAND & AVERT, 
STEREOTTPEES AND PRINTERS. 



To the 

Officers, Teachers, and Scholars 

of the 

Sabbath School of the First Congregational Church, 
J&iddletoTJcm, Conn., 

This Memoir of one of their number 

is affectionately inscribed. 



MM 



3y TrannW- 

39 \9tf 



PREFACE. 




>^< 



IRCUMSTANCES occurring in life often 
give prominence and importance to char- 
acters and individuals that might not 
otherwise have been brought to the 
public notice. 

Strength of purpose, finished beauty of char- 
acter, is an important part of the compensation 
derived from what is severe in trial and rigid 
in the discipline of earth. Hence, it is times 

of marked severity which not only create^ but 

v 



YI PREFACE. 



reveal for admiration the best features of man- 
hood. 

In nature, the rainbow is not photographed, 
except there be first the background of storm 
and cloud. 

"And darkness shows us worlds of light 
We never saw by day." 

The appalling scenes of civil war through 
which this nation is now drifting afford a rare 
opportunity for perfecting some of the divine 
forms of individual life, as well as for exhibit- 
ing to the world the wisdom and strength 
combined in our free institutions. 

By-gone ages, which we have been wont to 
view only through the hazy atmosphere of his- 
toric record, have rolled back upon us. And 



PREFACE. VII 



we are struggling in the midst of all that is 
heroic, grand, self-denying, enduring, to con- 
serve our priceless inheritance, as our fathers 
did to purchase and transmit it to us. 

And so the names and deeds of thousands 
are passing into materials for future history, 
which times of peace had left to a humbler 
sphere of light and influence. 

The life delineated in the following pages 
is chiefly valuable to intimate friends. 

If, outside of the circle of partial friendship, 
the volume shall seem to have merit, it will 
be due, in the main, to the fact, that it is the 
story of a Christian soldier, — one who found 
it sweet to die for his country. 

One whose example may stimulate others to 



VIII PREFACE 



feel that it is better to be sacrificed in the 
cause of the right in youth than to come to 
the grave of years through the hidden path 
of neglected duty and cowardly invirility. 



CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER I. 

FTS PLAC/R OF P.TRTTT-. EARLY YFARS, .... 


... 11 


CHAPTER II. 

HIS GREAT BEREAVEMENT — THE DEATH OF 
FATHER, 


HIS 

... 19 


CHAPTER III. 

SCHOOL DAYS — ENTERS COLLEGE, 


. . .29 


CHAPTER IV. 

BUSINESS LIFE, 


... 31 


IX 



X CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER 


V. 






TfP'T.TftTnTTS f.HARACTER .... 






.44 


CHAPTER 


VI. 






"FTSTTTSTS AS A SOTjDTER . 






.59 


CHAPTER 


VII. 






WOMAN AND DUTY — HIS MOTHER'S 


SACRIFICE, 


. 65 


CHAPTER VIII 


• 




DEPARTURE FOR THE SEAT OF WAR — 


CAMP LIFE 


.80 


CHAPTER 


IX. 






CLOSING SCENES OF LIFE, . . . 






.115 


CHAPTER 


X. 






BURIAL 






.135 


_ 






1 



LIFE AND CHARACTER 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



CHAPTER I. 



HIS PLACE OF BIRTH EARLY 

YEARS. 

ATURAL scenery has much to 
do in the formation of indi- 
vidual character. The grand 
and imposing in the outer 
world stimulate to the bold 
and elevated in thought ; while 
the beautiful and the tranquil 
serve to chasten the spirit, and adorn the 
life with the amiable and quiet virtues. 

The classic story informs us, that Her- 

11 




12 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

cules, the old prodigy of strength, engaged 
in his first successful battle for life, while 
the occupant of his cradle. 

It is no fable, to say, that ordinarily, the 
influences which wait upon the opening 
period of life are potent for good or ill, and 
serve not a little to give tone and color to 
the future. There is such a happy combina- 
tion of the grand and the less imposing in 
much of our American scenery as tends to 
produce the most favorable results upon the 
body and mind of the inhabitants. There 
is both strength and aspiration, and also the 
graceful and the pure. Among the more 
favored portions of New England, in these 
happy combinations, may be ranked the val- 
ley of the Connecticut ; and in this highly- 
favored section, few places will care to dis- 
pute the palm of precedence with the old 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 13 

town of Middletown, in the centre of the 
State of Connecticut. 

The small city, which retains the name of 
the town, nestles closely upon the river, just 
where it makes its graceful sweep, and turns 
aside from the pleasant dales, where it has 
so long proudly borne its course, to make 
its way more directly through a garrison of 
hills for the waters of the great deep, and 
becomes the open channel of commerce to 
and from the national metropolis. Ascending 
from the river a few hundred yards in this 
city, we reach High Street, distinguished 
for its elegant residences, inviting lawns, 
gardens, and flowering shrubs. The street 
is so thickly set with shade and ornamental 
trees on either side, that when the foliage is 
in perfection, the rays of the sun strive in 
vain to impinge on the ground. These prem- 



14 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

ises, being guarded carefully from the intru- 
sion of the sportsman, have become the 
elysium of various kinds of birds, where, 
at certain seasons, they pour forth their 
full flow of song, and add the finish to a 
scene of such attractive beauty. Midway 
in this street, which runs north and south, 
just where the curve of the rolling surface 
rises highest, stands the massive stone man- 
sion erected by the late Nathan Starr, the 
maternal grandparent of Edward. Front- 
ing on College Street, which descends the 
hill, just south of the spacious grounds 
which belong to this edifice, at the lower 
extremity of the orchard, stands the house 
where he was born, April 15, 1842. Here 
his mother and two sisters still reside. His 
mother had been married to Hamilton Brew- 
er, a young physician just established in 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 15 

his profession here, in the month of May 
of the previous year. The parents took 
this their first-born child to the sanctuary, 
where he received baptism, September first 
of the same year. Parental love of the 
most thoughtful and watchful kind guarded 
the child from the moment his being began. 
His infancy and childhood unfolded happily 
as a flower that enjoys continually the in- 
fluence of a healthful atmosphere, sunshine, 
and rain; and which is carefully protected 
from the sting of the hurtful insect. 

The most gratifying results of parental 
fidelity early appeared in the character and 
conduct of the child. He learned to shun 
the evil, and cleave firmly to the good. 
The defects and vices in character against 
which he had been warned at home, were 
quickly seen in others abroad, and received 



16 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF. 

the earnest expressions of his disapproba- 
tion. It is told of him, that he had a com- 
panion whom he tenderly loved, and in 
whose society he found much of his pas- 
time in one of his early summers. His ear 
caught from his lips one day the wicked 
word. The sport was at an end in a mo- 
ment, as Eddie turned sorrowfully away, 
saying, "I shall not play with you, if you 
use such naughty words ! " At first, the 
transgressor was disposed to brave it out, 
and sacrifice his companion rather than to 
correct the vice in his conduct ; but better 
judgment ruled his final purpose, and he 
gave the pledge of reform, and cemented 
more firmly than ever their friendship. The 
young hero had that day the triumph of a 
double victory: he ruled his own spirit, 
and taught another how to conquer himself. 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 17 

Life thus well begun can hardly fail to ex- 
pend itself in some broad field of usefulness. 
The home of Edward was ever a place 
of his cherished delights. The house was 
fashioned after an architectural model very 
common in the earlier periods of the coun- 
try, — double in front, with two stories sur- 
mounted with a gambrel roof. It holds an 
eligible position affording an extended view 
of the surrounding country. On the east, 
rise conspicuous in the distance the Cobalt 
Hills, at the foot of which, through the 
Narrows, the river forces its way, on the 
opposite bank of which are the silver mines, 
which were opened in the period previous 
to the Revolution. Thence, a little way 
south, stands prominent to view, White 
Rock, a favorite resort, and the Feld-Spar 
Quarries, from which have been gathered 



18 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

several choice minerals, besides the large 
exports which are annually made of the 
feld-spar itself for manufacturing purposes. 
On the west, within a minute's walk, at the 
head of the street, is the Wesleyan Univer- 
sity ; while a short distance below, arise the 
spires and towers of the various churches. 
Hedges and fruit-trees, vines, flowering and 
sweet-scented shrubs fill the yard and climb 
upon the building, and extend to the birds 
an invitation to make their home and re- 
peat their songs there, which they freely 
accept. Here the boyhood of the child 
flowed on delightfully to himself, and free 
from any great sorrow, until he had just en- 
tered his fourteenth year; then there settled 
a cloud over the home circle, which would 
never be fully removed. The young heart 
had come to the scene of its first .great trial. 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



19 



CHAPTER II 



HIS BEREAVEMENT DEATH OF HIS 

t/ ^) O FATHER. 

>HE Christian home ! What 
spot so choice on earth ? It 
is the fragment of a lost par- 
adise, which has come down 
to us through the ages. As 
the world now is, it seems 
impossible that any institution 
could be substituted in its place, fraught 
with so benign influences for individual 
man or society at large. It is virtue's gar- 
den ; the abode of purest love ; the sa A 
tuary of hallowed sentiments. Sweet har- 




20 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

mony of soul is there. God is there in 
covenant with man. 

How well adapted, too, the parental rela- 
tion, which exists in such a connection, 
to the necessities of childhood and form- 
ing youth. A double love, a twofold guar- 
dianship is placed about the morning of 
life, that nothing may check its healthful 
growth. Father and mother are there, — 
one to nourish and train the plant at home, 
the other to guide and protect it when 
borne forth into the atmosphere of the 
busy world. Man never appears more de- 
praved in himself, more cruel to his fellow- 
men, than when attempting to obliterate the 
family, or to weaken its influence, and to 
break down the towers of its strength. 
Death never seems more cruel than when 
he stalks boldly into such a sacred enclos- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 21 

ure and lays his chosen victim low. Espe- 
cially is the scene one of gloom and mystery 
when the family is young. When " parents 
are leading forth their little ones like a 
flock," how agonizing the hour, when the de- 
stroyer comes and bears one away ! And the 
parent, — must he die? What will become 
of those who need his care ? A few morn- 
ings since, I stood by a bereaved one as he 
struggled with his great sorrow. His wife 
was sleeping her last sleep by his side. His 
children were motherless. The sweet babe 
had been but a few hours on her bosom 
when her heart became cold and dead, and 
her tender care was evermore denied it. 
There was a cloud on the divine throne 
that hour, overshadowing that dwelling, — 
one we have often seen elsewhere. We 
could only bow the head and weep, saying, 



22 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

" Thy will be done," as the voice of speak- 
ing Love was heard through the gloom, 
"What I do thou knowest not now, but 
thou shalt know hereafter." 

At the period to which our narrative had 
come in the previous chapter, Dr. Brewer's 
family consisted of three children, — Edward 
and two younger sisters ; and the picture 
of home-life there enjoyed was such as 
might challenge the admiration of the be- 
holder. The father was exerting a widen- 
ing influence in his profession, and eliciting 
the warm esteem of all whom he met in 
the other walks and business relations of 
life. 

When in vigorous health, he was pros- 
trated by a fatal disease which terminated 
life after a few hours of intense suffering. 
His wife was a widow, his children father- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 23 

less! Were not such scenes so common, 
we should say they could not be endured. 
What a change for a young, buoyant life 
to pass through ! Just when needing a 
father's hand most, to have it relinquish its 
hold evermore ! Life is made up of periods 
or chapters ; scenes of pleasure now and 
here j times of trial then and there. Many 
a poor child has come to his first great trial, 
and been crushed by it; the young heart 
had not strength to endure. It is not every 
sapling that bows gracefully before the 
sweeping tornado, and comes up erect again 
in the wake of the tempest. To most per- 
sons, great sorrows are eras from which 
marked changes in personal character be- 
gin. Life is set forward, henceforth, more 
vigorously in the right direction, or it then 
takes a sudden turn downward to ruin. If 



24 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

the heart opens aright, as the barbed 
arrow enters it, truth leaves her healing 
balm there, and the blessing is sure. "I am 
fatherless; my mother a widow!" must have 
been the sorrowful reflection in the mind 
of Edward, as they returned from the grave 
to their desolate home, and sat musing in 
the evening twilight. These two facts were 
to him like two well-set eyes opening vivid 
visions of the future. His home, his heart, 
the world everywhere seemed sad, gloomy 
under the shadows they revealed. A child 
differently trained might have debated with 
himself whether he should not assume an 
air of independence, reject maternal advice 
and authority, and mark out for himself 
such a course for the future as would ac- 
knowledge no restraints but what might be 
self-imposed. How many a son has struck 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 25 



the rock of his destruction by rejecting the 
counsels of his mother at such a turn in 
life ! but not so was the decision in the in- 
stance before us. The noble, right-spirited 
boy finds two grand, governing purposes 
formed within hi in in that serious hour. I 
will do all that I can to bless and comfort 
my sorrowing parent. I will reflect the 
virtues of my father in my own life. Those 
purposes were like two loving, powerful 
guardian angels, and they kept the lad 
henceforth in the way he should go. 

As daily he looked upon the face of his 
bereaved mother, struggling between the 
cheerfulness it would bear towards her 
children, and the shadows of her deep 
sorrow, which were continually gathering 
there, his heart became brave for her sake, 
and his bearing was manly, dignified, under 



26 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

the thought that so holy a mission had been 
intrusted to him, — that he was to comfort 
the distressed, bear the burden of the heavy- 
laden. Sometimes there is a painful matu- 
rity created by these great changes in 
the outward circumstances of a young life. 
Childhood, with its imposed cares, its dis- 
turbed sources of joy, overleaps youth. 
Manhood goes down to embrace the child 
and aid in bearing its cares, and leaves its 
thoughtful impress on the plastic nature, 
and the child is no more young. Life thus 
forced to maturity by the discipline of ad- 
versity, does not ordinarily present the 
most pleasing picture for contemplation. 
The natural formation of a free, outgushing 
youth, with the healthy glow of innocent 
glee, is better, led, indeed, in wisdom's ways, 
and instructed by the counsels of unerring 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 27 

truth. Dwarfs in body, or very marked 
precocity of mind, are sources of pain rather 
than enjoyment to one who delights in the 
harmonies of a beautiful creation. 

Edward was truly a thoughtful boy. He 
was not likely to do things rashly. No 
gross transgressions in conduct are regis- 
tered against him ; yet his life was cheerful, 
and the yoke he was bearing seemed not 
too heavy, but like that which the wise 
man says it is good for one to bear in his 
youth. While he remembered the joys that 
had been tasted and were gone, he did not 
forget that others, and perhaps more pre- 
cious, might return. The world was still 
bright, though the sun had once been 
eclipsed. Much of the grief that would 
otherwise have remained in the home circle 
passed away in the charm of his presence 



28 



LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 



and the promises of his life. And so the 
father slept; the grave was closed; and the 
family looked out upon the future with a 
new hand pointing onward ! The bow was 
in the cloud. 




EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



29 



CHAPTER III 




SCHOOL DAYS ENTERS COLLEGE. 

NE who afterward became em- 
inent as a scholar is said to 
have been greatly incited in 
his purpose to obtain a liberal 
education by the sight of a 
school academy, and the daily 
ringing of the bell from its 
tower, in his hearing, as he was laboring, 
when a boy, in a neighboring field. 

Nothing was wanting to the educational 
surroundings of young Brewer's home to 
incite him in the same direction. The 
city high school was nearly opposite his 



30 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

mother's door, where hundreds of children 
assembled daily for their studies. The stu- 
dents of the college, located hard by, he 
met in all his walks. The house and 
grounds of his maternal parent were now 
converted into a classical boarding-school; 
other schools and seminaries of a high order 
were but a little more removed; so that it 
would hardly be possible for him not to 
cherish the thought of pursuing a regular 
course of classical study. Add to these 
the fact that his father had been a gradu- 
ate of the university, and a member of one 
of the learned professions, and his course 
for life seemed plainly indicated. The spirit 
of the boy was certainly not wanting in that 
direction. He pursued the studies consti- 
tuting the course preparatory to college, at 
the high school, and at the boarding-school 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 31 

of Rev. H. M. Colton, and entered the Fresh- 
man class in the Wesleyan University, in 
the autumn of 1859, when seventeen years 
old. 

After a few months of trial in the class- 
room, he became convinced that he could 
not pursue the prescribed course either 
with comfort or success. Distressing pains 
afflicted his head ; he was also at times 
troubled with discouraging weakness of the 
eyes. It was a terrible trial to abandon his 
cherished plans by taking up his connection 
with college. He was goaded to the quick 
when friends intimated that he was fickle, 
and lacked decision of purpose and energy 
in prosecution. He struggled long, before 
reaching a final conclusion as to what he 
ought to do ; but the disease still remained 
like a bitter foe, forbidding literary pursuits, 



32 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

and he at length turned sorrowfully and 
finally away from the bright vision which 
had tempted him onward. Some one has 
saidj " The setting of a great hope is like 
the setting of the sun, — darkness comes 
on, and then the stars begin to shine." So 
serious a matter as the change of all his 
plans for life did not leave the young stu- 
dent devoid of a purpose to accomplish some- 
thing. He had no patrimony to tempt him 
to idleness and dissipation. He must toil 
somewhere, — make the world feel his influ- 
ence for good in some department of honor- 
able industry. Life was too precious to be 
wasted. Surely the Lord had need of him, 
and he would work. 

He derived much pleasure and strength, 
during all these days of his second * great 
trial, from the thought that his mother sane- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



33 



tioned his course by her counsel ; and he 
could but believe that prosperity would, in 
the end, follow the fortune of that child 
who acted in accordance with parental wis- 
dom. Too many eminent men had attributed 
their success in life to fidelity to maternal 
influence to leave a doubt in that matter. 
The teachings of the sacred Word were 
too plain for him to cherish a feeling of 
uncertainty on this point. He had learned 
the words. " Honor thy father and mother," 
— which is the first commandment with 
promise, — " that it may be well with thee, 
and that thou may est live long on the 
earth." 

3 



34 



LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 



CHAPTER IV. 




BUSINESS LIFE. 

N former years, Middletown was 
quite extensively engaged in 
the manufacture of fire-arms 
for government service. The 
various streams that flowed 
through the valleys offered, at 
limited expense, the requisite 
power for running machinery, and held out 
inducements for capitalists to erect capa- 
cious buildings, which were converted to 
other uses in later periods, but, now that 
war is upon the nation, are more or less 
devoted again to their original service. The 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



35 



sound of the forge, the glare of the furnace, 
and the hum of the machinery do not cease 
now during the livelong week, telling the 
terrible haste there is in this work of death! 
It is our good fortune here in New Eng- 
land, to learn the magnitude of the national 
struggle through indirect channels, rather 
than under the immediate blighting influ- 
ence of marching and contending embattled 
hosts. The amount of laoor and capital 
employed in constructing the implements of 
war is no unmeaning witness on the subject. 
It makes the heart sicken when we pause to 
inquire, Where is flowing the strength of 
our young men, our arms and our treasures? 
If it were an enemy that had clone this, 
how easy, comparatively, to be borne ! but 
when our foes are those of our own house- 
hold, the sacrifice which we are called to 



LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 



make, by the fierce passions and unhallowed 
ambition of those who have taken the sword 
to destroy us, in defence of our sacred honor 
and blood-purchased rights, is greater than 
heaven is wont to claim of any people. " Oh, 
thou sword of the Lord, how long will it be 
ere thou be quiet ? " 

In this earlier government service, the 
maternal grand-parent of Edward was long 
and successfully employed ; and in later 
labors for furnishing the nation with arms, 
two brothers of his mother were extensively 
engaged. It seemed natural for the youth, 
now that his thought was turned to business 
pursuits, to look in the direction where so 
many of his friends and relatives had found 
their calling. An opportunity every way 
favorable was offered him by his uncles in 
their large factory in Binghamton, New 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



37 



York. He acceded to their proposal, deter- 
mined to master the business in all its de- 
tails, so as to secure for himself the best 
possible position. To this end, believing 
that he who would ultimately be master 
must begin at the very lowest part and 
ascend, he entered the manufactory as a 
careful learner. It was a severe trial to 
leave his home for this new start ; but not 
more so to him than to those he left behind. 
How deeply he cherished the desire that 
all should go well with the family of his 
love, is revealed by a letter he sent his 
eldest sister while at Binghamton. Re- 
ferring to an invitation which had been 
extended to her by her aunt to pass some 
time with her in New Haven, and express- 
ing the hope that her visit would be every 
way agreeable and profitable; to her, he adds: 



38 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

" But while you are at home, remember 
that you are mother's oldest daughter ; and 
that you ought to help her as much, as you 
can. I wish you to break yourself of the 
very bad habit you are indulging in, — of 
hugging the pillow in the morning, and thus 
robbing yourself of the best hours of the 
day for doing anything. As mother has 
taught us, and as I just begin to appreciate, 
remember the old and familiar maxim, — 
1 Early to bed and early to rise is the way 
to be healthy, wealthy, and wise.' 

" So rouse up, and do all you can to help 
mother bear her already too heavy burdens. 
By pursuing such a course, you will not 
only have her warmest love, but what pre- 
sents a far better and stronger motive than 
any earthly love, however pure, — you will 
have the approval of God. With his love 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



39 



in your heart, all will go well with you. 
Remember that this life is but a place of 
discipline, where we must all be tried, as 
silver is tried; and if we take a correct view 
of our trials, we shall not only, by them, be 
made better in this world, but under their 
influence ripen for our heavenly home." 

If in the change of pursuits he had ex- 
pected to find deliverance from his disease 
in the head, he was doomed to disappoint- 
ment. The trouble was aggravated rather 
than diminished, by the noise and confusion 
of the workshop; so that he felt obliged, 
after a few months' experiment, to return to 
his home to find rest. He came to us greatly 
depressed in spirit, sadly disappointed, ex- 
pecting to hear the old suggestion, want 
of stability. lie mingled but little in soci- 
ety ; and, contrary to his better judgment, 



40 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

he determined to return to the trial at some 
day not far in the future. We recall with 
sadness these days, because his spirit was 
so overwhelmed within him ; and he did not 
care to have it known that he was again 
beneath the paternal roof. There was a 
voice which he heard even then, speaking 
to his secret soul, as the notes of the friendly 
bell sound on the ear of the doubtful mar- 
iner, through fog and tempest, guiding him 
in the course he should go : " Commit thy 
works unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall 
be established. In all thy way acknowledge 
him, and he shall direct thy paths." Impor- 
tant changes in the business of his em- 
ployers caused his stay at home to be 
protracted beyond what had at first" been 
contemplated. In the mean time an open- 
ing occurred for the services of a young 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 41 

man in one of tho banking-houses of the 
city. The position seemed so desirable, that 
a large number made application for it. Ed- 
ward came to me one morning, exhibiting 
more than usual excitement and solicitude 
in his words and manner. He would not 
divulge the important secret in full, but 
desired such testimonials to his personal 
merit as might aid him in securing a busi- 
ness position on which his heart was set. 
A few days afterward we met; he was clerk 
in the Middlesex County Bank. The joy 
of his heart was full. The limited business 
hours presented ample opportunities for 
open-air exercise. The little garden where 
he had strayed when a child would feel his 
hand of cultivation. He could again launch 
his boat on the river, where in boyhood he 
had whiled away so many leisure hours. 



42 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

But the grand charm of the arrangement 
was found in being at home. Familiar skies 
were overhead ; the Lord's house, the home 
of his religious affections, was open there 
to receive him on the sacred day of rest j 
the social meeting, where his feet had been 
wont to go of an evening hour, invited his 
attendance. Here, too, he could be in the 
family, where his presence, counsel, and 
love to mother and sisters contributed more 
and more to their essential comfort. Be- 
yond the present, there opened to view an 
honorable and successful business, should 
he be faithful to his trust. Many, beside 
the youth and his relatives, thought they 
saw in all this the hand of Hirn who pities 
them that fear him, like as a father pitieth 
his son. It seemed to those who were 
familiar with his great personal merit, that 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 43 

nowhere else could he be more useful, by 
his example and efforts, than where he had 
been brought up. He had no need to go 
among strangers to have honor, or to meas- 
ure the strength of his influence. We leave 
him now, to attend to the calls and the 
routine of daily duty in the banking-house, 
to turn back a little and delineate his char- 
acter as light falls upon it from another 
source. 




44 



LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 



CHAPTER V. 



</^R 



RELIGIOUS CHARACTER. 

^HE high school, of which Ed- 
ward was a member in 1858, 
engaged in one of its de- 
partments the services of a 
yonng lady, as teacher, who 
thought not less of the moral 
and spiritual condition of her 
pupils, than of their literary attainments. 

She possessed to an eminent degree the 
faculty of enlisting the thought of the young 
in the subject of their personal relations to 
Christ r and their individual obligations to 
" Remember their Creator in the days of 




EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 45 

their youth." After the fatiguing labors of 
the class-room were over, she was accus- 
tomed to meet those of her classes who 
wished to spend an hour for religious con- 
versation at her own apartments, and, in a 
familiar manner, speak to them of God, and 
the way of life. 

The interest awakened in these twilight- 
hour gatherings became very great. The 
service was rendered so attractive under 
the chastened spirit of devotion which pre- 
vailed, that the place of audience was often 
crowded ; those who went once were at- 
tracted thither again. In that room, under 
the eye of that faithful friend, a number of 
young persons, for the first time, expressed 
religious hope. In these evening conven- 
tions our young friend was constantly 
found ; and there, for the first time, he 



46 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

spoke openly of the love of the Saviour in 
his soul. I remember the hour well. He 
solicited me to accompany him, as his pas- 
tor, that I might aid in giving direction to 
the thought of the inquiring. The sight 
was beautiful ; the scene one of great ten- 
derness, — such as our Saviour would have 
found the highest pleasure in beholding, had 
it met his eye when on the earth. It was 
like that in the temple, where the children 
sang their sweet hosannas. As the ques- 
tion went round, asking from each one an 
expression of his religious exercises, Ed- 
ward, in a few brief words, signified his 
deep interest in the subject of his salva- 
tion. There was no heated emotion, — no 
unusual excitement apparent, but a fixed, 
solemn determination to lead henceforth a 
life of devotion to God. There was a feel- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BEEWEB. 47 

ing of distrust in my mind at the time. I 
had hoped to witness greater pungency of 
conviction for sin, — more overpowering 
joy in view of forgiveness received. This 
feeling led to a more careful watch of 
the young converts, to see if their future 
life and conduct were such as to indorse 
the change as genuine. Most of the chil- 
dren and youth that constituted those meet- 
ings belonged to other congregations on the 
Sabbath ; and what the result was to them 
cannot be stated. Some made a public 
profession, — that is all I know of their 
religious life. The precious lamb that be- 
longed to my own fold never gave occasion 
for a doubt to exist but that he was indeed 
all that he had expressed a desire to be. 
Ho came freely to me with an open heart, 
seeking counsel in respect to all the more 



48 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

important affairs of his life. He seemed 
ever like a disciple in intimate, daily com- 
munion with the Saviour. With no high- 
wrought ecstasy, no remarkable zeal, there 
was sincere love to the truth, delight in 
the service of religion, and marked consis- 
tency in his daily walk and conversation. 
In a word, his whole character and conduct 
seemed to reflect the thought which formed 
the basis of all his actions, — that it was 
his most reasonable service to yield heartily 
to the claims of our holy religion. The 
impression remains now, as his life is re- 
viewed, that he was one of those who, at a 
very early period, was brought to know the 
Lord. His great bereavement — the loss of 
his father — may have been sanctified to 
him to that degree as to wean his affections 
from earth and sin and place them on holi- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 49 

ness and heaven. How well fitted such a 
scene to such an end ! As he looked upon 
the lifeless form of one whom he had so 
tenderly loved, prostrated by a fatal blow, 
unwarned, the lesson of holy "Writ must 
have been furrowed deeply into his tender 
heart, — " Man that is born of a woman is 
of few days, and full of trouble. He com- 
eth forth like a flower, and is cut doAvn ; he 
fleeth also as a shadow, and continucth not." 
It has been said that the source of power- 
ful controlling influences is often hid, like 
the obscure fountains which feed mighty 
rivers, — so here, beneath death's own dark 
shadows, may have been the silent agen- 
cies which controlled evermore that young 
life. There is great pleasure in tracing 
these evidences of a life of faith thus early 
begun in the heart of this youth, because 



50 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

the temptation is entirely taken away to 
set up a claim to a religious character for 
him, on the part of his friends, for less 
substantial reasons. One of the most un- 
happy influences flowing from the present 
state of our country is the feeling in the 
mind of so many, — that every man who 
sacrifices his life in this war for the Union 
dies a martyr, and goes to heaven, as a 
matter of course. Many of the patriotic 
songs which this state of the times has 
made popular, many of the addresses over 
the remains of our slain have embodied this 
pernicious sentiment. Patriotism is not pi- 
ety. Man may love his country, but have 
no love to God who has enriched him with 
such a goodly heritage. Thousands are 
dying by the sword in the service of the 
United States, in as righteous a cause as 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



51 



the sun ever looked clown upon, over whose 
grave no star of hope for future blessed- 
ness ever shines ; for they never came to 
Christ, and received his great salvation. It 
is as true of the soldier as of men in the 
other pursuits of life : "He that believeth on 
the Son of God hath everlasting life ; and 
he that believeth not the Son shall not see 
life, but the wrath of God abideth on him." 
It is too late in the centuries to revive the 
old doctrine of the crusaders. The Word 
of God sheds too clear a light to forsake it 
for the wild vagaries of Mohammed, or the 
fooleries of the Book of Mormon. The sins 
of no individual, or no class of individuals, 
are so heinous in the sight of Heaven that 
God gives eternal life as a reward for ex- 
terminating them by the weapons of war. 
Away with this soul-destroying doctrine ! 



52 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

On New- Year's morning, I860, it being 
the Sabbath-day, Edward brought his gift to 
Christ. It was himself, in those new forms 
of a holy consecration, connected with a 
public profession of his faith in the merit 
of the Redeemer. The scene in the house 
of God will not soon pass from the memory 
of those who witnessed it. He stood there 
in the great congregation, all alone, to per- 
form his vow. He was not yet eighteen 
years old, as in the presence of the great 
Searcher of hearts, angels, and men, he 
solemnly affirmed, — "I dedicate myself to 
God in Christ; humbly confessing and re- 
penting of my sins." There was one sitting 
near him on that occasion, whose cup of 
blessing was foaming to the brim. It was 
she who bore him an infant to the sacred 
font, and who now witnesses the fulfilment 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 53 

of the promise, and the keeping of the cov- 
enant: "I will establish my covenant be- 
tween me and thee and thy seed after thee 
in their generations, for an everlasting cove- 
nant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed 
after thee." With Hannah she can say, "My 
heart rejoiceth in the Lord ; " as the child 
she lent to the Lord as long as he should 
live, gratefully accepts her sacred act as 
his own, now that he with his own hand 
subscribes unto the Lord. The child rises 
up before her and calls her blessed, as he 
takes her by the hand, as it were, and leads 
her to the footstool of Sovereign mercy, say- 
ing, " Behold, Heavenly Father, my 
mother and the son of her consecration. I 
come to redeem her vows, and to praise 
thee for the covenant which has held and 
blessed me unto this hour." 



54 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

" 'Tis done, the great transaction's done, 
I am my Lord's and he is mine ; 
He drew me and I followed on, 
Rejoiced to own the call divine." 

The piety that is loving, healthful, needs 
to be employed in active service for God. 
The faith that justifies the soul by appropri- 
ating the merit of Christ, brings the be- 
liever into sympathy with the Saviour, so 
that, like him, he goes about doing good. 
To obey is the life of holiness. — The sun 
shines, — a good tree yields good fruit. 

The young Christian has a mind to work. 
He takes a place in the Sabbath school. 
Becomes an officer, where he had long been 
a scholar. His presence is all the more 
prized because there seems to rest upon 
him the mantle of one who had long 
cheered us by his mild and gentle life of 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 55 

goodness, but Lad now passed into the vale 
of eternal beiDg. 

During the warm season, the young men 
and others of our city are accustomed to 
form small parties for a few days' excursion 
to sea, or for recreations with the hook and 
line along the shore ; going out during the 
day, and coming in to shore for the night. 
Many a one, exhausted by close application 
to business, becomes invigorated by an epi- 
sode of this kind. While in the bank, feel- 
ing a brief respite from daily toil would 
afford him much pleasure and profit, Ed- 
ward joined a company of his associates in 
one of these excursions. They were ab- 
sent several days. Since his death, a friend 
who was with him has communicated an in- 
cident which came to his knowledge on that 
occasion, illustrating his thoughtfulness for 



56 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

the good of others. At night they occu- 
pied an old building, — the common resort 
of fishermen who might frequent those 
parts. In this old tenement, in one of the 
most retired parts of it, where one who 
wished to be in secret with his God would 
be likely to resort, is found, after they have 
taken up their connection with the place, a 
copy of the Sacred Word, bearing the name 
of " Brewer, " but underneath it, a line in 
his own hand, dedicating it to the use of 
those who in future might resort there. 
Trivial as the circumstance may seem to 
the thoughtless, it speaks volumes to those 
who know the worth of the soul, and the 
dangers of final ruin which constantly at- 
tend it. He who leaves a Bible where the 
sailor may read it has placed a lighthouse 
on the shore, just where dangers lie thick- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



57 



c±t. A circumstance of this kind gains in 
importance when it is remembered that 
many persons, while going from home for 
summer recreation, leave their Bibles and 
religion behind them. Our watering-places 
are not generally pools of Bethesda to the 
soul, whatever may be their healing virtues 
to the body. The country village which is 
so unfortunate as to furnish attractions for 
city boarders, does not generally improve in 
morals or religious influence, during the 
summer months. Religion and the re- 
straints of holy living are too often of 
secondary importance abroad, whatever may 
bo the profession and spirit of devotion at 
home ; the sight cheers us the more, there- 
fore, to see a young man go to his recrea- 
tions with Bible in hand, not only that he 
may keep his own soul in the light, but may 



58 



LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 



also give right guiding influences to others. 
The voice of the sea, as the waves break 
on the shore near that old shanty where the 
young Christian prayed and left his precious 
legacy to others, seems to swell with the 
song, — 

" There's a light in the window for thee, brother, 
There's a light in the window for thee; 
A dear one has moved to the mansions above, 
There's a light in the window for thee." 




MAR 



) 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



59 



CHAPTER VI 




ENLISTS AS A SOLDIER. 

N the latter part of July, of the 
last year, Captain Elijah W. Gib- 
bons, a resident of Middletown, 
who went into the service of 
the United States under the first 
call of the President for volun- 
teers, and who subsequently 
lost his life in the defence of his country, 
returned home from the army with a com- 
mission for raising new recruits. He 
opened his office in Main Street, only a 
brief distance from the banking house 
where Edward was employed, and where 



60 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 



the call for men was perpetually saluting his 
ears. The political horizon was overcast 
with deep gloom. The splendid army of 
the Potomac had disappointed the hopes so 
long cherished in respect to it, and was 
melting away under the influence of dis- 
couragement and disease, on the plains of 
the Chickahominy. A draft had been or- 
dered to fill up the ranks of the national 
army, suffering everywhere from a rapid 
and extensive depletion. 

The order for the draft in the different 
States was withheld for a time, in the hope 
that volunteers would come forward in such 
numbers as to supersede entirely the neces- 
sity for a resort to it. Towns and States 
offered munificent bounties to urge on the 
work of enlistment. The feeling every- 
where prevailed, that, in such a cause, coer- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 61 

cion should bo avoided if in the bounds of 
possibility. The moral impression needed to 
be kept up at home and abroad, in the 
army and among the States in rebellion, 
which had been created in the beginning of 
the struggle, from the spontaneous arising 
of the North to defend and preserve her 
sacred interests. Many men enlisted un- 
der the influence of those stirring appeals 
which were made to their patriotism, 
backed by such a consideration, who would 
have felt themselves justified for not enter- 
ing the Government service from any other 
consideration. 

Young Brewer belonged to this class. 
There were peculiar reasons in his case 
which would seem to warrant, his exemption 
from military service. I do not think 
among all who knew him a single one 



62 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

would have said his duty lay in that direc- 
tion. But his own impressions were clear 
in the premises, and his name was placed on 
the muster roll of the Fourteenth Regiment 
of Connecticut Volunteers. He was not a 
stranger entirely to military drill. He had 
been a member of the Home Guard, and en- 
joyed the tuition of his uncle, Col. E. W. 
N. Starr, who has the well-earned reputa- 
tion of an accomplished officer. There was 
much, also, in the associations connected 
with his native town, that might serve to 
awaken his patriotic ardor, and inflame him 
with desire to bear the sword in his coun- 
try's cause. Here was the honored grave 
of McDonough. Here Tatnall, bearing a 
fame once so bright, but now so inglorious, 
returned to the bosom of his family from 
the brave wounds and the brave deeds of 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 63 

Peiho. Here was the cherished home of 
Mansfield. 

An inspiration which he could not resist 
pervaded his souh Its words, stirring as 
the bugle-notes, were, — 

" Strike for your altars and your fires, 
God, and your native land." 

A charm was thrown over this act of en- 
listing as a soldier from the fact that so 
many of the choice youth of his acquaint- 
ance were to be enrolled in the same com- 
pany with him. 

The pledge had indeed passed between 
himself and his dearest earthly friend out- 
side the home circle, that they would stand 
shoulder to shoulder. Those who subse- 
quently saw the company on parade, and as 
it moved to its encampment and then to the 



64 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

seat of war, will not soon forget the form 
and features of Brewer and Fairchild, so 
lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in 
death not now divided. 

But there is another hardly less interest- 
ed in this question of enlistment than the 
boy himself. We must leave the child to 
see how this new phase of life reflects the 
mother. 

To thine heart, widowed one, there 
comes a word, — a joy and yet a knell. 
Thou hast a son to give ; but given, the 
altar-fires shall consume him quite. 




Purchased for the use c f 
ARMY AT LARGE. 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



65 



CHAPTER VII. 



WOMAN AND DUTY HIS MOTHER S 

SACRIFICE. 



HOEVER has moved his 
thought of lawful inquiry 
along the theatre of stirring 
events among men, where 
great characters have been 
fashioned, noble deeds have 
been done, and a lofty, di-. 
vine-like purpose has been imparted to the 
human will, and all the elements which un- 
derline and mould society have been so 
moved as to advance everything that is 
good to a higher plane of existence, has 
there found woman, by her untiring, unde- 




66 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

viating devotion to the right, imparting to 
her character a lofty heroism. 

It is quite obvious that those who have 
been engaged in the warm debates of our 
time, in reference to the " proper sphere of 
woman," are wholly incapable of appreci- 
ating her true position, or of discovering 
the majestic power of her influence as she 
moves onward in the silent orbit of her 
daily devotion to truth and duty. 

Why not ask as well, Where should the 
angels cf light find their appropriate field 
of labor? and bring them down from those 
invisible forms of love and toil in which 
they are sent forth " to minister for them 
who shall be heirs of salvation, 77 to the 
ugly, polluting contests of earth ? 

The proper sphere of woman ! What has 
she done ? Read her history. Mark her 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 67 

spirit of devotion, in the past, to all that 
is good and commendable. Surely, she 
has not been living through all the period 
of the centuries, constituting so important 
an agent, as she has done, in every field of 
action, and not yet have come to her proper 
place ! We shall find that her name and 
merit have not been wanting entire even 
where men have earned the meed of their 
proudest achievements by personal daring 
or profound wisdom. Miriam and Deborah 
were quite worthy of a place beside Moses 
and Barak in the camp or council-chamber. 
Palmyra and Babylon were rendered as 
illustrious under the royal rule of Zenobia 
and Semiramis as when the sceptre was 
held by any other hand. When has England 
been more illustrious than in the days of 
Elizabeth, or now, with Victoria on her 



68 LIFE AND CHAEACTER OP 

throne ? When has Spain sent her power 
and fame afar more extensively than when 
Isabella was a partner on the throne and 
the glory of the nation ? These are excep- 
tions to a general rale, and it is no matter 
for regret that they are so, for the merit of 
woman appears more conspicuous elsewhere. 
In the arts and sciences, too, she has an 
honorable place. Her hand has skilfully 
plied the chisel and given speaking forms 
to dead matter. She has touched the can- 
vas with the pencil, and beauty has ap- 
peared there in her loveliest forms. She 
has moved the telescope along the paths of 
the heavens, and guided to the fixed abode 
of the stars which was before unknown. 
But all these things may pass as the simple 
recreations of her leisure hours, her appropri- 
ate work is so much more sublime and heroic. 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 69 

Her sphere is preeminently one of en- 
durance. The gate of life is through her 
agonies. The blood of the saints, which 
has so often constituted the seed of the 
church, has flowed as freely from her veins 
as from others ; and she has never been 
found wanting when suffering was need- 
ful for the good of others. With Mary she 
she has stood by the cross when a sword 
has pierced through her own soul, "that 
the thoughts of many hearts might be re- 
vealed." It is an unshaken faith in the 
power of virtue and truth ultimately to win 
the day and gain the conquest, and boldly 
to follow where it leads, that arms the soul 
with a true courage ; — and such a faith 
has not been wanting as an overcoming 
power in the life of woman. Our Lord said 
of one whose name and praise have trav- 



70 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

elled down through many centuries without 
losing a single ray from their original bright- 
ness, " She hath done what she could." The 
world was against her ; yet she saw the fu- 
ture and believed in it. And like her, in 
all time, there have been many of her sis- 
terhood who have been moved and con- 
trolled by the same spirit of faith. 

The measure of the truly heroic is the 
amount of sacrifice which love is ready to 
make in accomplishing the end proposed. 

Correct estimates are not generally ob- 
tained in measuring the actual suffering 
among mankind. It is an established truth 
that the mere physical in suffering is light 
when compared with mental anguish. The 
criminal in the cell, tortured by thought, is 
more wretched than if bound to the se- 
verest bodily service, where his mind may 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 71 

be relieved of preying upon itself. The 
time of intense suffering to the soldier is 
when he meets the enemy for his first en- 
counter. Beyond that, danger seems past, 
however great in fact the toil and exposure. 
Without detracting in the least from the 
honor due the self-sacrificing soldier, — his 
meed of praise cannot be too widely sound- 
ed, — there is yet reason to believe that 
the real suffering, the agony of the sacri- 
fice is at home, where remain the mothers, 
the wives, and the lovers of the noble brave, 
— they are the ones who look on and view 
the strife, without the relief afforded by 
actual engagement. To them it appertains 
to see the face of the dead when the strife 
is over ; or to spell out the name of the 
loved and lost where no farewell sound 
comes from his dying lips, and no index 



72 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

guides to the place of his sleeping ; and 
the heart must bear the heavy thought, — 

'■ He is missing, evermore ! " 

From what has been derived from min- 
gling with those thus bereaved, — sorrow- 
ing, — my own election would be, so far as 
the matter of suffering is involved, to fall in 
the action which defends the right, rather 
than be doomed to stand where the desolat- 
ing wave should lave my feet while rolling 
up to view the mangled forms of my dear- 
est earthly friends, thus fallen. Ah ! how 
many a mother has felt, in such an hour, 
Would God I had died for thee, my son, 
my son ! The suffering, to a sympathizing 
nature, in the person of another is harder 
to be borne than in one's own person. The 
mother, to save her babe, robs her own 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 73 

breast of its warm covering, and freely lets 
the chill of death enter her soul. Damon 
prefers death in the place of his friend to 
life without him. 

In this department of suffering for others 
woman has ever been eminent. What ac- 
tion more heroic than that which, in the 
beginning of the missionary work among 
the heathen, bound sons and daughters to 
the altar of holy consecration. And were 
not a mother's faith and a mother's love 
the cords that held the victim there ? 

As faithful to the claims of a noble self- 
sacrificing patriotism as to her saving faith, 
she has freely brought of her choicest treas- 
ures when her country has so demanded. 
How the old Spartan mother has taught 
this lesson of fidelity to our country's weal. 
Die, my boy, rather than disgrace yourself 



74 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

while bearing the arms of your country. 
Such was the spirit she breathed into her 
soldier son. 

The same holy ardor inflamed the breasts 
of the American women in the period of 
the Revolution. The sentiment expressed 
by the wife of the elder Adams was the 
one that ruled that anxious hour: "I feel 
a pleasure in sacrificing my selfish passions 
to the general good, and in imitating the 
example which has taught me to consider 
myself and family but as the small dust of 
the balance when compared to the great 
community." 

In this department of patriotic devotion, 
the spirit of woman partakes more of the 
morally sublime, the exalted heroic, because 
it is so disinterested, and expends itself in 
such unobtrusive forms. 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 75 

Man may seek honor on the battle-field. 
He may there be placed in a situation to 
exalt himself, to earn and receive the 
adulation of admiring thousands. But the 
mother, as she bids her son go ; the wife, as 
she cheerfully yields her husband to what 
seem to her claims prior to her own yearn- 
ing heart, — what is to be her gain person- 
ally? She never stops to inquire. She 
may be a widow ; she may be sonless. Be 
it so ; the sacrifice shall be made, if God 
and duty so demand. 

Noble, disinterested, self-sacrificing wo- 
man ! I see thee, the admiration of men 
and angels, in the person of Mary, standing 
by the cross of thy son, dying to save a 
world ! I see thee shedding rays of a 
divine light in our primitive forests, as, in 
the person of Pocahontas, the red man's 



76 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

daughter, thou dost interpose thine own 
life to save a stranger from the merciless 
tomahawk. 

I see thee rise on the wings of angelic 
loveliness and holy devotion, in the person 
of Florence Nightingale, as thou dost hasten 
from affluence and ease to the tented field 
of the dying soldier, to bind up his wounds 
and comfort his despairing spirit. 

Yes, nearer still, I see thee in thy labors 
of holy love this day all through the loyal 
states, with toiling hand providing freely 
for those who, in camp and hospital, lie 
wounded, dying, for their country's sake. 
Has not thy mission been well defined, 
then ? What cause has flourished to which 
thy hand has not given strength ? Who has 
suffered, and thou hast not been in agony 
with him? Hast thou not been sent, like 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 77 

him who bowed the heavens and came 
down to heal the broken-hearted, to give 
comfort, hope, salvation, to die, if need be, 
to bless the world? 

Was there ever a time since the memory 
of man when woman more heroically filled 
this her sphere of self-denial and endur- 
ance than just now when she offers so 
freely her sons, brothers, husband, for the 
nation's salvation ! 

Truly the heroic age is upon us. The 
Spartan mother, the old Roman matron, the 
women of the times of Washington and 
Bunker's Hill, are with us in these days 
of trial. Whatever else has deteriorated in 
the flow of time, surely not devotion to the 
right, — a pure patriotic ardor, the proudly 
heroic in the life and devotion of woman. 
Hope, bright, cheering hope, meets us here, 



78 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

right here. When the mother of Augustine 
entreated her bishop to labor for the con- 
version of her wayward son, at first he re- 
pelled her entreaty ; " but seeing her tears, 
and marking the patience of her impor- 
tunity, he said, ' Begone, good woman ; it 
is impossible that the child of such tears 
should perish.'" 

As there meets us this view of hearty 
devotion to their country's weal from our 
mothers and daughters, while the national 
struggle moves on, we are certain that our 
government cannot be destroyed, or ulti- 
mately weakened seriously in the arm of 
its power. If men are derelict in duty, 
the enemy shall be sold into the hand of 
women. If Barak is wanting, Deborah will 
not be ; and Sisera, if need be, shall die, 
smitten by the brave arm of Jael, and his 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 79 

mother shall look in vain for his return 
with the spoils of victory in his hand. 

It was to a mother who belonged to this 
class of self-sacrificing ones, one who was 
alive to the magnitude of the struggle 
through which the nation was passing, 
and who felt that nothing was too sacred 
for her to give to aid in turning back the 
scene of peril, that the young soldier whose 
story of life I am telling presented his 
request for permission to go to the battles 
of his country. Doubtless, the thought 
was not new to her. She had witnessed 
the young men all around her passing away 
on a like holy mission, and had been long 
praying for grace and strength for this 
hour, should it come. Her noble boy ! can 
she give him up? He is her only son, her 
first-born. In him she sees the form and 



80 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

features of her departed husband, ren- 
dering him doubly dear. There is a 
strange, startling premonition that if he 
goes, he will return to her no more. Her 
assent will be his death-warrant. She 
knows well that he who has never gone 
counter to her approval leaves the deci- 
sion with her. Yes ; go and bear thy part 
in thy country's agony. 

The maternal sacrifice was laid upon 
duty's altar, that day, 

"in tears and pain." 



->©. 




EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



81 



CHAPTER VIII. 



DEPARTURE FOR THE SEAT OF WAR LIFE IN 

CAMP. 

RIGHT decision in duty 
is a central power which 
brings into vigorous exer- 
cise and appropriate bear- 
ing all the energies of life 
in man. Hence a youth, 
often, no sooner settles the 
question of his future course of action than 
he seems to have a new existence imparted 
to him. His soul is all on fire to reach the 
appointed goal, so that ordinary discourage- 
ments are powerless to check his progress. 
One who long observed young men during 




82 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

their college course remarked, that, when a 
student had decided to be a foreign mission- 
ary, everything he undertook in the routine 
of daily labors was prosecuted far more 
successfully than before. Let the goal be 
set aright and it gives speed to the race. 

Persons of eminent success in some one 
department are often decried, because they 
pursue a single idea. But is it not the 
single aim that always leads when grand 
results are reached ? The man who has de- 
termined to do one thing well has started 
on the road he must take to greatness if he 
ever gets there. It is truly refreshing, in 
this world of so much misdirected energy, 
to mark the course of one whose life flows 
on under the guidance of a single aim, 
whose very being says, " Wist ye not that I 
must be about my Father's business ? " " For 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 83 

me to live is Christ." " The age in which I 
live must feel the elevating power of my in- 
fluence." These men of one idea are the 
sharpshooters who so skilfully disarm the 
foe and render useless their heavy artillery! 
God bless them ! 

Edward was at my door as he returned 
from this interview with his mother. I met 
him as his foot rested on the threshold. 
He declined to come in, but extended his 
hand, as he bade me good-by. There was 
an earnestness in his word and manner, 
which had not appeared before. A great 
thought was urging him on. He was dedi- 
cated to the service of his country. • He 
was to become an actor in the gloomy trag- 
edy. His courage was up, his arm was 
nerved. He might not be hindered. The 
word of benediction was spoken. We did 



84 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

not exchange salutations again. The Four- 
teenth Regiment, into which his company 
was enrolled, as Company B, was encamped 
for a few days at Hartford, Col. D wight 
Morris, commanding. August 25th, they 
embarked for New York on board of one of 
the propellers that ply between the two 
cities, hastening on their way to the scene 
of strife. On that day, as they sailed down 
the river, many a son of Middletown took 
his final look of the delightful city of his 
home and cherished affection, where the 
sunny past seemed more bright, as it was 
fading so rapidly from view, and sunset hues 
in the horizon of joys that might never re- 
turn were whispering with the closing eye 
of day, — 

" Good-night, good-night." 

In the first letter received from young 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 85 

Brewer after their departure, he says to his 
mother, " xVs we passed Middletown, I saw 
you on Fisk's Dock and took off my hat and 
waved it. I tried hard to have you see 
me." Had they mutually seen the near fu- 
ture, how their eyes would have flowed into 
each other, treasuring up more sacredly 
than ever, each, the loved features of the 
other ! 

At no time in our great national struggle 
has the excited state of public feeling been 
at a greater height than when this regiment 
was en route for the seat of war. Gen. 
Pope's campaign in Virginia had proved 
a most disastrous and humiliating failure. 
The second defeat of Bull Run had sent a 
panic not only through the army, but the 
entire North, as the forces of the enemy, em- 
boldened by success, were pressing their 



86 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

way by rapid movements into territory 
deemed hitherto safe from their incursions. 
The dangers of the hour forced into ser- 
vice where battles raged hot and fierce 
those who had just enlisted from the field 
and workshop, store and bank, and who 
were totally unprepared by previous train- 
ing for the hard work in hand. 

We have reached now a period in our nar- 
rative when the letters of the soldier be- 
come the light of his life. As they were, 
with only two or three exceptions, ad- 
dressed to his mother, the substance will be 
taken by extracts without preserving the 
formal address. 

His first letter is dated "Fort Ethan Al- 
len, Va., August 3d.," and gives us a vivid 
insight into the intense earnestness of the 
business upon which they had been sent. 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 87 



" We crossed Long Bridge, Washington, 
Thursday noon, and arrived at our camp- 
ground, near Fort Richardson, late in the 
afternoon. We went to bed early, and, at 
three o'clock, Friday morning, were hustled 
out, and made a forced march of twelve 
miles to Fort Ethan Allen. Last night we 
slept on our arms, expecting an attack; and 
now, while 1 am writing, the guns are boom- 
ing in the distance. I am well and in good 
spirits, awaiting the enemy in the rifle-pits 
of the fort." This letter was written the 
sixth day after the regiment sailed from 
Hartford, and yet there they are in the very 
den of death, awaiting his terrific approach ! 
It is no marvel that the son finds occasion 
to caution his mother not to indulge in anxi- 
ety on his account, with the assurance "I 
am right." Still his heart has undergone an 



88 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

amazing change if he really supposes she 
can fail to be exceedingly anxious when he 
presents to her view such a picture of his 
own exposure. Her boy in the rifle-pits, 
awaiting the enemy, and the mother not 
anxious ! 

The division of the army to which his reg- 
iment belonged was moved forward as rap- 
idly as the operations of the enemy and 
their own circumstances would permit, to- 
ward the section of the State of Maryland 
to which the invasion was directed. On 
the 11th of September, he writes from 
Clarksburg, Md., " We have been put 
through so fast since leaving Fort Ethan Al- 
len that I could not write you at an earlier 
date. Last Saturday we were ordered to 
pack our duds and be ready to march at a 
moment's warning. But evening came and 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 89 

found us still in our encampment. Orders 
were then given for us to sleep on our 
arms. Sunday morn the command was, to 
march as quickly as possible. At two 
o'clock we were under way. The section 
of country through which our line of march 
lay looked fresh and nice; for war had not 
desolated it. Our route was through sev- 
eral small towns ; and Saturday night we en- 
camped just outside of Frederick, where I 
expected to enjoy a quiet Sabbath, and re- 
fresh myself by going to church. But war 
allows no Sunday. At three o'clock we 
were ordered out, and told to be ready to 
march again as soon as possible. We were 
pretty tired, but that made no difference ; 
go we must. For several days we could 
hear the roar of the cannon of our advance, 
following up and harassing the retreating 



90 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

ranks of the enemy. Our division did not 
arrive in time to take part in the engage- 
ment at Middletown Heights, but we crossed 
the ground after it was over." 

Edward's superior officers early discov- 
ered that he was qualified for some other 
service than that of a mere private in the 
ranks. He might be more useful with the 
pen than the sword. While on their march 
from Virginia into Maryland, he was de- 
tailed as clerk to Gen. French's headquar- 
ters. His new office was by no means a 
sinecure. He gives us an outline of his 
work : — 

" The first thing in the morning is to get 
up and prepare my breakfast. Mind you, I 
do not sit down to a table all made ready at 
my hand, as when with you. But I have to 
get my own breakfast. Washing face and 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 91 

hands is entirely superfluous; and I don't in- 
dulge in that operation except when I have a 
chance , which is not every day, by any 
means. Water is a precious article here, 
and I know how to prize it now, if never 
before. 

" About eight o'clock in the morning my 
duties as clerk begin. I first make out the 
countersign papers for the day, of which 
there are seven. Next are the orders de- 
tailing regiments for picket duty, and for 
the outer lines, and one for the inside picket 
reserves ; making in all ten orders to begin 
with. This I call my play work, and always 
have it off my hands at ten o'clock ; then 
commences the hard work, in the shape of 
orders, reports, &c., from different generals 
in the division, and from Gen. McClellan's 
headquarters, of each of which there must 



92 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

be five copies, when I make any ; and 
sometimes one order occupies three pages, 
and sometimes an entire sheet of large size 
letter-paper." So much did his hands find 
to do in those wearisome days that he says, 
" Out of seventeen days we have been at 
Harper's Ferry, there have been but five 
when I could find time to cook my regular 
meals, and I have often been under the 
necessity of getting along with one meal, 
and several times have written until after 
eleven o'clock at night." He breathes this 
story of his over-work into the ear of his 
tender parent, not to complain of his lot, nor 
to intimate a single regret that he has gone 
forth to the toil and exposure, but simply as 
his apology for not having written her more 
frequently. It is not difficult to believe the 
tale of his complete exhaustion, when he 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 93 

says, " I have been so tired of writing, that, 
when I had time to send you a few lines, 
my hand ached so, that I had not energy 
enough to make the attempt." 

The terrible battle of Antietam, Md., of 
the 17th of September, 1862, has already 
been enrolled in the bloody annals of his- 
tory. The earth has been far richer in 
human gore and precious dust since that 
gloomy though triumphant day. The Four- 
teenth Connecticut Regiment, undisciplined 
as it was in the art of war, and most of the 
men who composed it only a few days out 
of the home circle, was brought into the 
heat of that engagement. Edward, being in 
the clerk's department, was detained by his 
duties in the rear of the army, and was con- 
sequently not exposed to the raking fire of 
the enemy. Report came to his ears that 



94 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

many of his companions were cut down. 
Two days after the battle, still uncertain of 
the actual facts in the case, he writes, 
" Our company lost a good many men, but 
here it is Friday, and I have not seen any 
one to inform me how the matter stands. I 
am in a perfect fever of anxiety to know 
who are killed, wounded, and missing." 
The startling report came to his home, that 
he himself was among the number of the 
slain. But the hour for him had not yet 
come. It proved subsequently that only 
one of Company B was killed in that en- 
gagement, — that a townsman of Edward's, 
a member of the same Sabbath congrega- 
tion and Sabbath school. Robert Hubbard 
was the shining mark at which the cruel, 
"insatiate archer' 7 aimed his fatal dart on 
that day. It would seem as if the fell de- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 95 

stroyer might have spared even him, for our 
own noble Mansfield had already fallen. 
Holding a commanding position upon an 
eminence overlooking the battle-field, as the 
fight went on, the general's clerk " had a 
full view of the thrilling scene, and heard 
the not very pleasant music of whizzing 
and bursting shells." Gen. Mansfield, who 
fell early in that day's work, had known the 
young soldier from Middletown from his 
early life. They met just before the en- 
gagement began. The youth was over- 
joyed to see the veteran, his own friend 
and his mother's friend. And the heart of 
the general was moved with tenderness 
as he grasped the hand of inexperienced 
youth and contemplated the fearful struggle 
that was opening immediately before them. 
" He looked well, but seemed sad, as he pro- 



96 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

nounced his benediction, " God bless and 
keep you. Take good care of yourself. I 
hope in due time you will be restored to 
your home and friends." As the words 
flowed from his lips, he put spurs to his 
horse and was quickly at the head of his 
division, in the very jaws of death. The 
old and the young are now both alike at 
rest. Sweet spring-time has already shed 
her beauty and fragrance over the graves 
where we have laid them. 

The horrors of war, in the more aggravat- 
ed forms of its appalling features, come 
after the struggle is over, when the 
ploughed, gory field is left to the dead and 
dying. Our young friend embraced an op- 
portunity which offered, to survey the field 
of the slain. " The second day after the 
battle, I went over a part of the field, some 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 97 

ways to the right of the position held by 
our division. Not that I really have a rel- 
ish for such scenes, but just to satisfy my 
curiosity for once, in the survey of such a 
scene. And I then saw enough to check 
all further desires of a like kind. The posi- 
tion held by the enemy, covering a distance 
as far as from the college to Main Street, 
about one-fourth of a mile, was strewn with 
their dead. In some instances, piled one 
upon another, with limbs broken, and 
doubled under the body of the slain, they 
were lying as they fell in the engagement, 
in every conceivable posture. Back of these 
lay scattered those who fell during the re- 
treat to a position behind the fence, while 
behind the fence the dead were piled up 
three or four deep. In a clover-field about 
two hundred feet wide, the entire space 



98 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

was strewn with guns ; knapsacks, blankets, 
canteens, dead horses, men, belts, cart- 
ridge-boxes, &c. &c. Crossing this lot, I en- 
tered the woods to note the destruction 
caused there. Trees nine inches in diame- 
ter were cut completely off by the shells, 
and others of larger growth were so shiv- 
ered that a heavy wind would prostrate 
them. Shot and shell thickly covered the 
ground in all directions. In an open space, 
there stood a building which in days of 
peace must have been used "to teach the 
young ideas how to shoot" but judging from 
present appearances, it had just now been 
taken as a target for artillery practice. It 
was literally riddled from floor to ceiling, 
and here, too, stretched in death, were a lot 
more of those miserable fanatics, known as 
rebels. I went through the hospitals. The 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 99 



view which met me there was revolting. 
To see the wounded, hear their groans, wit- 
ness the physicians at their duties, sur- 
geons amputating limbs, — here an arm, and 
there a leg, — it has made me sick at heart." 
As might naturally be expected, the sud- 
den transition from all the comfort and care 
of home to the exposures and personal neg- 
lect of the camp, together with the intense 
excitement of mind, and the close applica- 
tion to his appointed duties at headquar- 
ters, induced disease of body, followed ulti- 
mately by great prostration of strength, 
from which he was never afterward fully 
able to rally. The malaria of the camp gen- 
erally is more fatal to life than the weapons 
of war. Harper's Ferry, at the time the 
Fourteenth Regiment was there, seemed 
totally abandoned to pestilential influences, 



100 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

and it was next to certain death for one to 
sicken there. 

The poor boy, who had never lacked a 
gentle and skilful hand to nurse him before, 
presents a discouraging picture of himself 
in a letter written September 30th. 

"I have had the diarrhoea almost ever 
since I came out, and I cannot get rid of it. 
It makes me so weak, that it is not pleasant, 
to say the least. I wish you would tell me 
what is good for it, — that is, what herbs or 
barks that I can get and administer to my- 
self." Still he is disposed to take a hopeful 
and even mirthful view of things though 
depressed and enfeebled. " Give my love to 
1 Cretia/ and tell her I wish I were as fat as 
her rabbits, but assure her I am about as fat 
as the match Uncle H. tells about." A life 
so valuable ought to have been cared for at 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 101 

this stage of wasting disease ; and if the 
young soldier could not get well in camp or 
hospital ; why not send him where the only 
chance of recovery presented itself, — to 
his home? 

Pleasant as Edward found it on many ac- 
counts to be clerk at headquarters rather 
than retain his place in the ranks, there 
were some considerations which rendered it 
more desirable to be with his company. 
His unselfish nature wished for no indul- 
gence denied his companions in arms. 

" I am hardly willing/' he says, " to stay 
here at headquarters, and take things so 
comparatively easy, when the boys in the 
company are having it tougher than my- 
self. I started out with them, expecting to 
share in their hardships and participate in 
their joys. But I was ordered here, and 



102 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

here I have been. So that I have the satis- 
faction, at least, of knowing that I have 
obeyed orders, and I think it would have 
been just the same if I had been ordered 
to charge with the rest np to the cannon's 
mouth, because I made up my mind when I 
left home to forswear ease and comfort, and 
take up with the lot of a soldier, whatever 
it might be, and, i God helping me,' to go 
wherever ordered, and spill my blood, if 
need be, for my country's cause. But now 
that I am in a place of comparative safety, 
it seems as if I deserved little or no credit 
for coming, and what you say of the com- 
mendation of friends, on account of the step 
I have taken, makes me blush. But I am 
glad for your sake, dear mother, that I am 
so favorably situated. Were it not for you, 
I should leave for the company instanter." 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 103 

A most serious part of the trial connected 
with the separation from his company was 
the loss of the society of his bosom friend, 
Fairchild, who had been his intimate associ- 
ate in all the pastime of home-life from 
early years. Those were precious hours of 
joy when they met in tent or camp. 

"Amos was here last evening and spent 
the night with me, and a pleasant time we 
had. He was not feeling very well. I do 
not see him very often, nowadays, as he is 
some distance from my quarters, and I am 
so busy writing that I cannot get away." 

When a dear friend has gone forever 
from sight, many little incidents are often 
recalled, which made no very deep impres- 
sion at the time of their occurrence, but 
which in review reveal the fact, that an in- 
visible hand of love was shaping things for 



104 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

the final separation, in those delicate arrange- 
ments which might prevent the full force of 
the crushing blow in its final descent. We 
know not how it is, but when the terrible 
event is announced, we seem to see many 
an index which had pointed in that direc- 
tion and which whispered, " It may come." 

Mrs. Brewer remembers now that there 
came to her home from her son one day a 
letter, containing pictures, hair, a ring, &c. 
She. was startled when she broke the enve- 
lope and noted the contents. What ! is the 
dear one already gone, that these memen- 
tos are sent home ? No, not that ; still, 
they may be but the precursor of such a re- 
sult. She reads, " I sent my pictures home 
because I wanted to be rid of the trouble of 
taking care of them, that is all. You will 
also find a lock of Amos's and my hair. We 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 105 

reserved the hair for you when we were 
barbered fighting style, but I forgot to send 
it until now. My finger has become so 
emaciated that my ring will not stay on ; so 
I return it to you for safe keeping." Was 
not God lifting the veil which conceals the 
future, little by little, to that parent's eye, 
so that the shadow of the hastening ill may 
fall across her path before all is night ? 

His division of the army was at Warren- 
ton, Va., when a change w T as made in the 
department of Commander-in-Chief. Gen. 
McClellan was removed from that position, 
and Gen. Burnside temporarily occupied 
the place. Nov. 10th was the day when 
the change took place, in presence of the 
army. The " soldier-son " embraces the op- 
portunity, " wdien the general and staff are 
away," to forward a letter home. The cold 



106 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

season has now set in, and a winter in camp 
is the opening prospect. If he may not 
pass the season of cold and storm in the 
home circle, they must do something for his 
comfort abroad ; and so he sets down various 
articles that he wishes to have forwarded to 
him. He displays excellent judgment and 
a careful economy in all matters of this 
kind. The useful and the good alone had 
attractions for him. 

He is very favorably impressed with the 
appearance of Burnside when at the head of 
the army, because he detects in him a taste 
like his own in the matter of dress. " I 
have seen him a number of times before/' 
he writes, Nov. 14th, "but never had so 
good a view of him as to-day. He is a fine- 
looking man. Dresses very plain ; wears 
no insignia of rank whatever. Just the 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 107 

kind of officer for me. I have had about 
enough of gold-lace officers, who seem to 
care more about their traps than for a faith- 
ful discharge of the duties assigned them." 
There is one day in the year, if no more, 
when every son of New England lays his 
plans, if possible, to be at home. What a 
social bond has been created \>y the careful 
observance of our time-honored Thanksgiv- 
ing ! How it holds the child, roam where 
he may, to the cot that gave him birth, — 

" Where blend the ties that strengthen 
Our hearts in hours of grief, 
The silver links that lengthen 
Joy's visits when most brief." 

" I was away from home," writes the ab- 
sent son, "on last Thanksgiving-day, and I 
then thought nothing would keep me away 
this year; but I little thought then that I 



108 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

should be in my present business." We 
seem to see the tears gushing from his eyes 
as the old festive board, laden with its rich 
viands and surrounded by happy, smiling 
faces, passes in review, and he remembers 
it will be far, far away from him ; but he 
dashes them away and summons up his 
brave heart to* cheer one who needs words 
of comfort more than himself. 

" Never mind ; I hope I shall see home 
again sometime, when war is over and 
peace once more reigns. It does seem, in 
any view, that this state of things must ter- 
minate before long. But if you could be 
out here at the l seat of war/ where I am, 
and see the poor fellows around you dying, 
worn out by marches and disease, and thus 
measure the misery brought upon us by 
this awful war, then you would be yet more 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 109 

anxious to have it ended, and the soldiers 
sent back to their own homes. I am very 
thankful that these scenes of war are so far 
removed from you, and that while fearful 
carnage devastates this part of the country, 
'our home,' with its pleasant memories, is 
safe from destruction at the hands of sol- 
diers." 

Thanksgiving-day, as noted on the calen- 
dar, came, but not the visit home. Nor did 
the box of good things, the tokens of home- 
love, so much expected, so earnestly de- 
sired, reach the absent one in camp. The 
encampment of Edward's division was at 
Bell Plains, Va., on this day. If his hand 
could not partake of good cheer, his heart 
was as a sunny land when he pictured the 
scene in camp for the eyes at home. 

" Yesterday was Thanksgiving-day, and 



110 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

the regiment was favored with speeches 
from several officers, songs were sung, and 
the governor's proclamation read. I made 
my dinner from ' salt-horse ' and ' hard-tack/ 
and it tasted first-rate. I was very hungry, 
and that is a pretty good sauce. I hope 
you at home had a pleasant time, but I flat- 
ter myself you would like to have seen the 
missing one in his place." 

At length, disease has so impaired his 
health and strength that he is disabled 
longer to discharge the duties of the clerk- 
ship, and he is released from his position at 
headquarters, under the expectation of be- 
ing sent to the army hospital at Washing- 
ton, to receive proper medical treatment 
and quiet. But his regiment being detailed 
from the regular service to guard supplies 
at Bell Plains, he joined his company there, 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. Ill 

and found his health so much improved, in 
connection with lighter labors and old com- 
panions, that he preferred the camp and 
friends to the hospital and strangers, and so 
remained at his post. 

The Army of the Potomac is at length in 
position for the winter, and we have a view 
of tent-life at Falmouth, where Edward 
passed the last months of his life. It is 
said by those familiar with the two cities, 
Middletown, Ct., and Fredericksburg, Va., 
that there is a striking similarity between 
them in many particulars, but especially in 
location. The latter lies delightfully upon 
the Rappahannock, with hill and dale, as the 
former docs on the peaceful waters of the 
Connecticut. It may have afforded some 
consolation to the soldiers from this place, 
to trace the resemblances to their "home 



112 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

land " in that, as they lay in sight of it dur- 
ing the long days of winter inaction. Bet- 
ter thoughts than these may have come to 
the mind of one who was gradually, though 
unconsciously to himself, passing down to 
the grave. As he daily sent his vision 
across the river to the city whose towers 
and spires greeted the eye, and from which 
strains of music came floating on the night 
air, he may have wandered in imagination 
in the streets of that city built upon the 
river of divine pleasure, where shall be no 
"battle of the warrior with confused noise 
and garments rolled in blood/' but whose 
walls are salvation and whose gates praise. 
Early in February, 1863, he writes, " I lived 
in a Shelten tent part of November and all 
of December, but now occupy a Sibley tent, 
which is rather more comfortable, though 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 113 

for the last two or three days it has been so 
cold that it is wellnigh impossible to keep 
warm anywhere. It has been snowing 
quite hard to-day and feels very wintry. I 
am quite comfortable just now, however, 
sitting in the hospital by the fire while writ- 
ing you. There is nothing of interest go- 
ing on here, and if there were, I am too 
feeble to be much excited by it. For some 
cause I cannot get strength, and find it 
very laborious to keep about. But I trust 
in God, and hope to be better soon." 

Oh, how hope leads on the captive of dis- 
ease, but only promises to deceive ! 

" Hopes, what are they ? Beads of morning 
Strung on slender blades of grass, 
Or a spider's web adorning 

In a straight and treacherous path." 

8 



114 



LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 



CHAPTER IX 




CLOSING SCENES OF LIFE. 

HEN General Hooker took 
command of the Army of 
the Potomac, he awoke the 
fj^9 gratitude and inspired the 
confidence of the soldiery 
by his prompt and vigor- 
ous measures to improve 
the comfort and health of his men, Impor- 
tant changes were made in the quality and 
variety of the provisions. Edward cheered 
greatly the heart of his mother and friends 
when he wrote, March 8th, "I am beginning 
to improve under the influence of the good 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 115 

rations provided since the advent of Gen. 
Hooker. To a certain degree, at least, the 
improvement is attributable to this source. 
Our food now is the best we have had since 
we left home. We have plenty of salt also, 
for the want of which we have really suf- 
ered. When I speak of improving in flesh, 
if you could see me, I guess you would 
think there was room for improvement in 
that direction. The calf of my leg is about 
the size of my arm when I left home. Tints 
I am rendered rather weak in the under- 
standing. Never mind ; if you can count 
my ribs now, I hope to be of some service 
yet to my country, and also live to see 
home and friends once more. But God 
rules and reigns, and he will do with me as 
secmeth to him good, and it is our wisdom 
to commit ourselves to his care. In his 



116 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

own good time we shall meet again ; if not 
in this world, we trust it will be in a better, 
where wars and rumors of wars never 
come, and where the wicked cease from 
troubling and the weary are at rest." 

His tender heart was pierced as it had 
not been since the death of his father, when 
the intelligence came into camp that Fair- 
child was dead. He had been sick in the 
hospital at Washington for a long time, but 
it was generally supposed his recovery was 
only a question of time, when his disease 
came suddenly to a fatal termination. He 
breathes his grief to his eldest sister : " I 
do not write in so cheerful a strain as I 
had been wont when addressing you. I was 
very sorry last night to hear of the death of 
Amos. He was as dear to me as a brother. 
In fact, I called him such. The news of his 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 117 

death came so unexpectedly that I was not 
at all prepared for it. This, taken in con- 
nection with an unfeeling remark made by 
the physician, — ( that he knew he was very 
sick and he had sent him off to get rid of 
him/ — so affected me I could not stay in 
the tent, where I had gone to make inquiry. 
I went to my own lodgings and mused a 
while in quiet, and then read in my Testa- 
ment, and went to bed. But I could not 
sleep for a long, long time. Little did I 
think when he left the regiment that I 
should never see his face again on earth. 
But I trust we shall meet again in heaven." 
In the picture-gallery of their native city, 
there is a full-length likeness of these two 
youths, on the same card, in the full uniform 
of the soldier. We think of them now, as, 
in robes of light, — the righteousness of 



118 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 



saints, — they stand together in the great 
army of the blessed above ; the union re- 
stored for which the weary, lonely one lay 
sighing in his tent at Falmouth. 

His words again to Mary are, "I don't 
feel right in health yet; but as warm 
weather comes on, and genial breezes fan 
the brow and quicken the blood, I hope to 
be well again. Enclosed is a card, contain- 
ing the Lord's Prayer. It was written by 
Lieutenant Heath, under my own eye, and 
is about as fine a specimen of penmanship 
as I ever saw. Thinking it would please 
you, I bought it. Kiss Emma (his young- 
est sister), and tell her I am looking for that 
promised letter from her. When I next 
write home, I will try to send her a sort of 
a curiosity that T am going to make for 
her." 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 119 

One of the last letters ever penned by 
him was addressed to his great-uncle, who 
had watched over him from childhood with 
the most tender interest and affection. His 
home was just across the fields from his 
mother's, and the two families are wont to 
flow together almost daily. It gives some 
glimpses of his tent-life not before imparted. 
The disease which has been upon him for so 
many months, requiring unwearied attention 
by night and day until it would seem that 
the strongest and most robust constitution 
must succumb to it, though in a measure 
checked, is still exceedingly troublesome, 
precluding all possibility of undisturbed re- 
pose at night To meet this insidious foe, 
he must be perpetually on the alert. He 
must be armed cap-a-jne at all hours. "You 
would laugh, I think, to see me go to bed, 



Lr l 



120 LIFE AND CHAEACTER OP 

for I have to get in boots and all, which is 
not quite so comfortable a method of sleep- 
ing as I have been used to, but for the past 
two months 1 have not dared take them off. 
It does not strike me as the most healthy 
way of sleeping, and I would sacrifice a 
good deal to be able to take off my clothes 
and jump into a good bed. I hope sometime 
in the future to enjoy again the comforts of 
home and the society of friends. I feel 
almost alone here now, so far as 'old 
friends ' are concerned. One by one, those 
who enlisted in the company with me have 
gone. Some have been discharged, some 
sent to the hospital; out of the number 
only one has died, but he to me was more 
than a brother. Had I dreamed when we 
last met that I was looking upon his well- 
known features for the last time on earth,. 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 121 

how different would have been the parting 
scene ! But a wise Providence closes the 
veil which conceals from us the future, and 
I thank God it is so; for how often would 
life itself be embittered if we knew before- 
hand what was going to happen to our 
friends. Why, it seems to me, of all tor- 
ture that would be the worst. During an 
intercourse of many years, Fairchild and I 
have never, to my knowledge, had an angry 
word pass between us. He was always the 
same even-tempered boy. I had hoped we 
should enjoy each other's society for years to 
come, but God wills it otherwise, and, hard 
as is the blow, I try to submit in patience, 
trusting that, in that better world to which 
1 believe he has- gone, we, together with 
1 loved ones ' gone before, shall walk the 
golden streets and never more be parted.'' 



122 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

In paying this tribute to his friend, Ed- 
ward was unconsciously delineating some of 
the most amiable traits of his own character. 
If two youths associate together for a long 
term of years, and during that period when 
the young blood is quickest up, without 
"an angry word passing between them," it 
is quite evident that the amiability is not 
entirely on one side. Had Amos lived to 
speak of his deceased friend, his words 
would have been no less earnest, mournful, 
tender. It may be added, appropriately, in 
respect to him, that he too was the son of 
a widowed mother. He died in the hospital 
at Washington. His remains were sent on 
to Middletown for interment. The funeral 
was attended by a very large concourse 
from the Methodist church, of which he 
was a member, and then his body was fol- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 123 

lowed with military honors to the family 
burying-ground, commanding a view of his 
childhood's home and the flowing waters of 
the Connecticut. The sermon preached by 
his pastor, giving a brief sketch of his life 
and character, was published, and has been 
read with interest by many. 

One more communication closes the se- 
ries of letters from the absent son to his 
friends at home : — 



" Camp Fourteenth Regiment, Conn. Vols., 
March 22d, 1863. 



} 

" Dear Mother : — Yours of the 17th has 
just reached me, and I should think mine of 
the 8th was about long enough in reaching 
you. Enclosed is a tract for ' Cretin/ 
which I hope will suit her ; also please find 
enclosed a little ring for Emmie. I shall 
not tell you now of what it is made, because 



124 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

I wish to have you guess and see if you can 
tell. I hope it will fit her. She is such a 
little body that I could not easily decide 
how large it ought to be. Tell her I re- 
ceived her letter. It was very interesting 
indeed to me. I hope she will write me 
many more. Kiss her and Mamie for me. I 
am growing fat, and begin to look like my- 
self again. I think I shall be quite well be- 
fore long. I am deeply thankful to our 
heavenly Father that it is so — that he is 
restoring me to health. I dread the idea 
of marching again, though. There was a 
skirmish up the Rappahannock a few days 
ago, and the troops here were all put under 
arms, with orders to be ready to march 
at a moment's warning, as a rebel raid 
was constantly expected. 

" The troops were not brought into ser- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 125 

vice, however. The next day we saw forty 
prisoners go by our camp, clothed in gar- 
ments of as many colors as the famous coat 
of Joseph. These were taken in the fight 
referred to. The weather here is becoming 
quite mild, and every morning as I awake 
my ears are greeted by quite an orchestra 
of the feathered songsters congregated in 
the neighboring bushes. The robins have 
been seen for about a month. Their pres- 
ence and their singing remind me quite for- 
cibly of the notes they have been wont to 
carol from the trees around my own pleas- 
ant home, and which home I shall hope to 
see next summer if I live. From all ac- 
counts, I judge the rebels themselves to be 
sick of this war and nearly starved out. 
They told our pickets, the other day, that 
they were subsisting on half-rations. 



126 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

" I have not written the kind of letter 

which was intended when I began. But no 

time is left me for expressing regrets. The 

mail is abont closing. I shall write you 

again in a few days, however. With much 

love to all, I remain, 

" Your affectionate son, 

" Eddie." 

More than two months have already 
elapsed, and that pledge to " write again 
soon " has not been redeemed. The lone 
mother looks in vain for the letter ad- 
dressed in that familiar hand, breathing its 
words of thoughtful care and tender love. 
Other letters in the mean time have been 
received, which solve this problem of 
silence. 

In fact, this letter had hardly come under 
the eye of the one to whom it was ad- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 127 

dressed, when a telegram was handed in to 
the family, from the chaplain of the Four- 
teenth Regiment, bearing the astounding 
intelligence, that Edward would not proba- 
bly survive the day. New forms of disease 
had set in, and such as precluded all hope 
of recovery. The shock was terrible, even 
like the bolt of heaven which prostrates a 
friend lifeless at our feet. It was plain to 
be seen, however, that strength was given 
to the stricken parent from Him who says, 
" Cast thy burdens on the Lord and he shall 
sustain thee." The mother determines to 
hasten to her sick son the ensuing morning 
if the next message informs her he still 
lives. But with the evening hour came a 
letter saying all was over. April 2d, 1863, 
at half past one, noonday, the spirit of Ed- 
ward Hamilton Brewer, let loose from the 



128 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

bonds of flesh, went home to God. Epilepsy 
of the severest kind was the immediate 
cause of his death. He was at his dinner, 
better in health, apparently, than he had 
been for many months, when the paralyzing 
blow fell upon him. Spasm after spasm fol- 
lowed in quick succession, throwing his 
body into terrible contortions, and painting 
fearful agony on the features of his benig- 
nant face until they reached the number of 
twenty-six. when the silver cord was loosed, 
and the golden bowl was broken. The 
evening previous to his death, he sat till 
midnight conversing with one who had 
nursed him during all his sickness most 
tenderly* In full confidence of returning 
health, he expressed the desire to remain in 
the army until the great questions at issue 
were honorably adjusted. Not for a mo- 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 129 

ment would he indulge the thought that his 
country could be dismembered. The Union 
must be restored, at whatsoever expense of 
treasure and blood. In the converse of that 
night, religion, a theme ever so precious to 
him, became a familiar topic. He spoke of 
his hope of the future, and the prospect 
opening before him beyond the dark river, 
should his life be cut short, through the 
merit of a risen Saviour, in whom alone he 
trusted for life and salvation. Then, as 
there came floating by the cherished visions 
of other days and home-life, he told of his 
love for the Sabbath and the sanctuary 
where he had been wont to worship. The 
Sunday school also shares largely in his 
warm attachment, and then there comes up 
that brightest scene in all the week, when 
in the closing hours of the holy day his 



130 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

mother was wont to sit with him and the 
other members of the family, making the 
Word of Life their study and the precepts 
of the gospel the lessons of the occasion. 

" Season of rest ! the tranquil soul 

Feels the sweet calm, and melts to love; 
And while these sacred moments roll, 
Faith sees a smiling heaven above." 

Had he been aware that the end of earth 
was so near to him, he could hardly have 
spent those hours more profitably to himself, 
or in a way more grateful to surviving 
friendship. 

He is found at his post of duty the ensu- 
ing morning, and passed the forenoon entire 
as usual. The blow which prostrated and 
killed was so powerful in its descent that he 
was thought to be unconscious of suffering 
after two or three of the earlier attacks. 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 131 



He did not speak, or seem to observe what 
was passing about him, until a few moments 
before he breathed his last, "when he 
opened his large eyes, and, with a bright, 
pleasant smile, such as lights up the Chris- 
tian's waning life," as it reflects the visions 
of coming glories, looked his farewell greet- 
ings on those about him, then closed them 
in the long tranquil sleep of death, and so 
is " evermore with the Lord." 

" Oh ! 'tis a placid rest, 

Who should deplore it? 
Trance of the pure and blest, 

Angels watch o'er it! 
Sleep of his mortal night, 

Sorrow can't break it; 
Heaven's own morning light 

Alone shall wake it." 

The chaplain of the Fourteenth Regiment 
is a native of MiddlctoAvn. He had, from 



132 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

his first connection with the army, evinced 
a lively interest in the condition both spirit- 
ual and temporal, of the men under his 
charge. With young Brewer he had been 
intimate ; drawn to him because he was 
sick, and because he was good. Immedi- 
ately upon his death, he wrote the afflicted 
parent a letter full of the details of the 
closing scene, and of tender consolation to 
her wounded heart, in which he says, — 

"I had the fullest confidence in his reli- 
gious hope. The nature of his brief illness 
precluded the possibility of obtaining an 
expression of his feelings in the trying 
scene of death. But a dying testimony 
was not needed from him. He undoubtedly 
loved his Saviour and abhorred impurity 
and wrong. He shuddered at the exhibi- 
tions of profanity- and sin which he was 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 133 

compelled to witness daily, and grew more 
and more anxious to become spiritual- 
minded, and Christ-like. He conversed 
with me freely on religious topics as oppor- 
tunity presented, and evidently enjoyed 
such themes. 

" I looked upon him as one on whom I 
could rely for good example before the un- 
godly, and as a sympathizing, Christian 
brother. Last Sabbath evening, as he sat 
beside me, he gave an account of the 
method in which he was accustomed to 
spend the evening of the holy day when at 
home, and spoke with heightened emotion 
of the delight he should experience when 
the old privilege should be again renewed." 

The surgeon, too, who had long had him 
under his care, adds his testimony to the 
great worth of his character as lie offers 



134 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

his sympathy to the sorrowing. He thus 
writes : — 

" While I deeply sympathize with you in 
your affliction, I can look back upon his ex- 
emplary life during the time I have known 
him, — and for a long period previous to his 
death he had been employed in my depart- 
ment as a clerk, — and see many things to 
praise, but nothing to censure or condemn. 
I believe he was a sincere and true Chris- 
tian, and our loss has been his immeasurable 
gain. 

" Many more must fall, smitten by disease 
and the bullets of the enemy ; many more 
mothers 7 hearts will be torn by the sad 
news of their fall, before this wicked war is 
ended ; but they die in a noble cause, and 
I hope their sufferings and death will not be 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 



135 



CHAPTER X. 




BURI AL . 

UR holy religion presents the 
doctrine of the resurrection as 
one of those animating truths 
which spread gleams of light 
and joy amid the darkness 
and gloom of the battle-field. 
Thousands have fallen who 
will never be gathered in burial to the sep- 
ulchres of their fathers, where affection can 
adorn and bedew with its tears the hallowed 
spot of their repose, yet they are safe under 
the eye of God. Home-love follows in vain 
the path of the warrior to gather up its slain 
on many a gloomy plain, whele the living 
have plucked the glor) - uf igh achievement. 



136 LIFE AND CHARACTER OP 

It was as a precious balm to a broken 
heart that the friends of Edward were 
spared such a sequel. Death had no sooner 
fixed his features in that placid, happy ex- 
pression which they had been wont to bear 
when he slept calmly in his own room at 
home, than the embalmer set them firmly 
there for the eye of love to contemplate. 
Though the gem had been taken, the casket 
remained most precious. It was a beauti- 
ful afternoon on the first of April, that I 
was conducted to the room where the body 
of my young friend lay in this its last re- 
pose. There he was, surely, the only son 
once more in the endeared home of his 
childhood* Those that so fondly loved him 
were about him. We forgot for a moment 
that the scene was Death's own. It seemed 
rather a tableaux of one who had lain down 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. Vol 

for pleasant dreams. The sleeping soldier. 
The soft radiance of the setting sun flowed 
in through the window, playing about the 
pillowed head of the prostrate youth, as 
often the beams of the morning enter the 
room of the tired child, not to disturb, but 
to lull him yet longer to repose. His 
parted lips were just as when in childhood 
he slept well. The scene held us as by en- 
chantment. We saw the face which for 
months had been veiled from sight. We 
only needed now the look from the speaking 
eye, the warm grasp of the hand, and the 
word of salutation, and the scene of joy 
would have been complete. The night 
passed away, and another morning came, 
but alas ! he waked not. 

We bore him then to the house of God, 
just where, an infant, he was carried by his 



138 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF 

parents, when in faith he was consecrated 
to Jehovah ; just where, a youth, he had 
made a public profession of his faith in 
Christ ; just where his measured steps had 
trod the hallowed floor as a devout wor- 
shipper. Our prayers were offered at the 
mercy-seat. Our words were spoken. Our 
requiem sung mid tears and sad regrets 
that one so good and true should die 
ere yet manhood had placed her crown of 
age and privilege fairly on his brow. But, 
while the heart was heavy and the head 
sunken low in grief, the trusting spirit said, 
" Thy will, Gocl, be done." 

Thence to the grave we bore him, pass- 
ing by the Bank where his form had so 
often been seen entering the door-way, or 
as he stood looking from the window or 
busily engaged with the daily duties at his 



EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 139 

desk. At the grave, we lowered him gently 
down, sorrowing not as others who have no 
hope, for there fell on the ear the words of 
the Lord Jesus: — 

" I am the resurrection and the life ; he 
that believeth in me, though he were dead, 
yet shall he live." 

With such light of immortal life flowing 
into the narrow house, we could not say 
farewell to him whom we must leave there, 
but only this, — " Good-night. We shall 
greet each other again in the morning." 

Wordsworth's hymn of the child, " We 
are seven," has melted many a heart. 

Often, as the summer-day comes to its de- 
cline, the mother and sisters of Edward re- 
sort to his grave, embowered beneath the 
evergreen tree in the old cemetery at the 
head of Washington Street. 



rchased for the use of the 
ARMY AT larpc 



140 EDWARD HAMILTON BREWER. 

As they stand there weeping, or planting 
flowers, the simple thought of that child 
presents the picture of a united family, 
though the father, two sons, and a daughter 
are with the dead, and the mother and two 
daughters alone survive. 

The thought, too, is more than poetical. 
It is a divine truth. The family which on 
earth has been bound together in saving 
Christian love can never be permanently 
separated. The pious dead are not lost, but 
gone before. 

Let then the transient love of earth par- 
take of the holy and heavenly in its charac- 
ter; and though death cause grief in the 
present, the future restored joy to which it 
leads shall be everlasting. 

" The Christian dies to go home." 






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